Tag Archives: writer’s block

Sorry, to clarify – this was composed Saturday 6th March when I was on my way back from Wales to Lancaster.

So, another post brought to you from the belly of the train across our beautiful countries. The train is still passing through Wales, shortly to arrive at Cardiff. Beauty abound in the outside world, flecked with the grime on the windows of the train.

Wales, and Ferryside more specifically, have always been where I’ve considered to be ‘home’ for all intents and purposes. I’ve lived in the country of mountains, delicious cawl, and sheep almost all my life and nearly half of that time we’ve been in Ferryside, a small coastal village where almost everyone knows almost everyone else and the concept of a ‘strongest man contest’ in the village square (which is also the village car park) is met with enthusiasm, dressing up and community spirit.
The village itself is immensely beautiful – the view from the bridge over the railway track is phenomenal. Beach, dunes, rivers, fields, forests; we have it all. Old houses, new houses, a shop, a hotel and spa, pubs, tennis courts, churches, a school, a post office. Anything you want from a village really. Bus and rail connections to further afield areas too.
So since I was ten years old, Ferryside has been home. It’s the house I’ve spent the longest in, the one my family and I have really made ‘home’. We’ve made changes to it, fixed and broken it (I’ll never forget the time that the cat fell through the kitchen roof – the hole still hasn’t been fixed). Most of all, we’ve made it ours.

For as long as the thought has been there, I’ve wanted to raise my future children in Wales. I’ve wanted them to be steeped in Welsh culture, be Welsh speaking, and celebrate St. David’s day with the same passion for their homeland as I do. Given the choice, there is nowhere I’d rather call my home country.

Recently though, there has been a change in my outlook. No longer do I consider ‘home’ to be that tiny village. No longer do I see myself as an old lady walking along the beach with my grandchildren running around, chasing after the dog. Now, it’s Williamson park I’m walking through. My children will have Lancashire accents, not Welsh ones. They’ll never learn Yr Wyddorr, they’ll learn the alphabet instead. This saddens me somewhat – I want to further the language, I want my family to have the same experience of my part of the world as I do. But it won’t be home for them, I don’t think. Not anymore.

Lancaster is a wonderful city. Historic and steeped in culture and beauty, its only drawback is being so close to Morecambe. But Morecambe has its own redeeming qualities of course – the beach is the major one for me. I have never lived so far away from the sea as I do now in Lancaster and even knowing that it is a short bus journey away if I need it is a comfort. From my front door in Ferryside, a sufficiently powerful throw could land a stone on the beach.

I have been thinking recently about writing. I want to write! But I am so short of ideas that I’m not sure I’ll ever make it as an author. I have the ability to write (or so I’m led to believe) just there’s nothing in my head to write about. I can’t come up with characters, a world, or a plot. I lack inspiration. My muse has left me. The only thing I can be inspired to write these days are these live journal posts, where I prattle on about nothing relevant or interesting.

The train is very busy today. I try my best to not do this journey on Saturdays – people are going all manner of places over the weekend and they all seem to be on my train. I used to pick a person and wonder about who they were – what was their story. These days I can’t even come up with lives for the myriad of people around me. Not the trendy looking seventeen year old couple in the seats to my right, or the posh couple with their ‘Upper Crust’ coffees in front of them. It used to be so easy – why is it now lost to me? And why is it that when something is denied to us we want it, crave it even more fervently? Writing has always been something I’m interested in, and have done off and on for years (mainly Fan Fiction, but it’s still writing). Now though, I can’t do it and I so desperately want to turn my time and my words into a story for others to read and enjoy.

Like this:

I used to think that some people were just luckier than others, that some people just had a higher roll of the dice than others. Then I got older, and my views shifted. I began to think that ‘luck’ wasn’t really a thing, so to speak, it was people who carved their own paths through life, and the things they did and the actions that they took were what influenced their ‘luck’. Karma, so to speak.

Now though, my views have shifted again. A friend of mine, someone very wise, gave me some good advice when I was feeling low.Disequilibrium is life’s natural state. When you feel like you’re having bad luck, it’s because your life is shifting and changing, and the universe is trying to restore balance and normality.

Some people belive in luck – that’s their call. These days I just think that everything needs some kind of balance.